by Randy Alcorn
Because of Jesus Christ's sacrificial death on the cross on our behalf, God freely offers us forgiveness. "He does not treat us as our sins deserve or repay us according to our iniquities. . . . As far as the east is from the west, so far has he removed our transgressions from us" (Psalm 103:10-12).
Forgiveness is not automatic. If we want to be forgiven, we must recognize and repent of our sins: "He who conceals his sins does not prosper, but whoever confesses and renounces them finds mercy" (Proverbs 28:13). Forgiveness is established by our confession: "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just and will forgive us our sins and purify us from all unrighteousness" (1 John 1:9).
Christ offers to everyone the gift of forgiveness, salvation, and eternal life: "Whoever is thirsty, let him come; and whoever wishes, let him take the free gift of the water of life" (Revelation 22:17).
There's no righteous deed we can do that will earn us a place in Heaven (Titus 3:5). We come to Christ empty-handed. We can take no credit for sal vation: "For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast" (Ephesians 2:8-9).
This gift cannot be worked for, earned, or achieved in any sense. It's not dependent on our merit or effort but solely on Christ's generous and sufficient sacrifice on our behalf. Ultimately, God's greatest gift is himself. We don't just need salvation, we need Jesus the Savior. It is the person, God, who graciously gives us the place, Heaven.
JOINING THE BODY OF CHRIST: THE CHURCH
You may think that you don't deserve forgiveness after all you've done. That's exactly right. No one deserves forgiveness. If we deserved it, we wouldn't need it. That's the point of grace. On the cross, Jesus experienced the Hell we deserve, so that for eternity we can experience the Heaven we don't deserve.
Once forgiven, we can look forward to spending eternity in Heaven with Christ and our spiritual family (John 14:1-3; Revelation 20:11-22:6). We need never fear that God will find a skeleton in our closet and say, "If I'd known you did that, I wouldn't have let you into Heaven." Every sin is washed away by the blood of Christ. Moreover, God is all-knowing. He has seen us at our worst and still loves us. No sin is bigger than the Savior. If God wasn't willing to forgive sin on the basis of Christ's sacrifice, Heaven would be empty.
Jesus said, "Watch out that no one deceives you" (Matthew 24:4). There are countless groups, religious and secular, that will assure you Heaven is your automatic destination or that it can be attained by your hard work and abstention from certain sins. This is false—there is no salvation except by Jesus and his redemptive work.
False teachers can be attractive and persuasive, often quoting the Bible out of context. But they should be rejected because they contradict God's Word (Acts 17:11). False doctrine is one reason the Christian life should not and cannot be lived in isolation. We must become part of a family of Christians called a church, where God's Word is believed and taught. You may feel self-conscious around other Christians because of your past. You shouldn't. A Christ-centered church is not a showcase for saints but a hospital for sinners. The people you're joining are human, imperfect, and needy. Most church people aren't self-righteous. Those who are should be pitied, because they don't understand God's grace.
A good church will teach God's Word and provide love, help, and support. If you have further questions about Jesus and about Heaven, you can find answers there. (If you're looking for such a church in your area but can't find one, use the address at the end of this book to contact our organization, and we'll gladly help you.)
To those who presumed they would go to Heaven because they were religious, Jesus said, "Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of Heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will say to me on that day, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and in your name drive out demons and perform many miracles?' Then I will tell them plainly, 'I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!'" (Matthew 7:21-23). Those who assume their religious activities alone will get them to Heaven have a terrible surprise ahead.
Do not merely assume that you are a Christian and are going to Heaven. Make the conscious decision to accept Christ's sacrificial death on your behalf. When you choose to accept Christ and surrender control of your life to him, you can be certain that your name is written in the Lamb's Book of Life.
WATER FOR THE THIRSTY
After showing us the new heavens and New Earth, Jesus says near the end of the Bible, "I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. To him who is thirsty I will give to drink without cost from the spring of the water of life" (Revelation 21:6). But then Jesus adds these sobering words: "He who overcomes will inherit all this, and I will be his God and he will be my son. But the cowardly, the unbelieving, the vile, the murderers, the sexually immoral, those who practice magic arts, the idolaters and all liars—their place will be in the fiery lake of burning sulfur" (Revelation 21:7-8).
There have been times when I think we do not desire heaven but more often I find myself wondering whether, in our heart of hearts, we have ever desired anything else.
C. S. LEWIS
For those who know Christ, their place is Heaven. For those who do not know Christ, their place is Hell. Jesus said, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me" (John 14:6). There is no middle ground. Either you are a follower of Jesus or you are not. Christ said, "He who is not with me is against me" (Luke 11:23).
The Bible ends with yet one more invitation, suggesting that God wants to give every reader one last chance: "The Spirit and the bride say, 'Come!'And let him who hears say, 'Come!' Whoever is thirsty let him come; and whoever wishes, let him take the free gift of the water of life" (Revelation 22:17). It is Jesus—and Heaven—we thirst for. Jesus and Heaven are offered to us at no cost because he already paid the price for us.
God invites you to come. The church invites you to come. As a follower of Jesus, I invite you to come.
Why would you not come? What reason could be good enough to turn away from Jesus and from eternal life in the new heavens and New Earth? In the words of C. S. Lewis, "All your life an unattainable ecstasy has hovered just beyond the grasp of your consciousness. The day is coming when you will wake to find, beyond all hope, that you have attained it, or else, that it was within your reach and you have lost it forever."44
You are made for a person and a place. Jesus is the person. Heaven is the place. They are a package—you cannot get Heaven without Jesus or Jesus without Heaven. We will explore Heaven's joys and wonders throughout this book. But we dare not presume we can enter Heaven apart from Christ.
"Seek the Lord while he may be found; call on him while he is near" (Isaiah 55:6).
Have you confessed your sins? asked Christ to forgive you? placed your trust in Christ's death and resurrection on your behalf? asked Jesus to be your Lord and empower you to follow him?
Wouldn't it be tragic if you read this book on Heaven but didn't get to go there?
SECTION TWO
UNDERSTANDING THE
PRESENT HEAVEN
CHAPTER 5
WHAT IS THE NATURE OF
THE PRESENT HEAVEN?
Pippin: "I didn't think it "would end this way..."
Gandalf: "End? No, the journey doesn't end here. Death is just another path . . . one that ive all must take. The grey rain-curtain of this world rolls back, and all change to silver glass. . . and then you see it."
Pippin: "What? Gandalf? See what?"
Gandalf: "White shores. . . and beyond. The far green country under a swift sunrise."
Pippin: "Well, that isn't so bad."
Gandalf: "No . . . no, it isn't."
Peter Jackson'sfilm The Return of the King
The apostle Paul considered it vital for us to know what happens when we die: "Brothers, we do not want you to be ignorant about those who fall asleep, or to grieve like the rest
of men, who have no hope" (1 Thessalonians 4:13).
Using the euphemism "those who fall asleep," Paul speaks of those who have died. If we are alive at Christ's return, he assures us we will be "caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so we will be with the Lord forever. Therefore encourage each other with these words" (1 Thessalonians 4:17-18).
Most of this book will be centered on the eternal Heaven—the place where we will live forever after the final resurrection. But because we've all had loved ones die, and we ourselves will die unless Christ returns first, we should consider what Scripture teaches about the present Heaven—the place Christians go when they die.
THE TEMPORARY NATURE OF THE PRESENT HEAVEN
When a Christian dies, he or she enters into what is referred to in theology as the intermediate state, a transitional period between our past lives on Earth and our future resurrection to life on the New Earth. Usually when we refer to "Heaven," we mean the place that Christians go when they die. This is what I am calling the present or intermediate Heaven. When we tell our children "Grandma's now in Heaven," we're referring to the present Heaven.
By definition, an intermediate state or location is temporary. Life in the Heaven we go to when we die, where we'll dwell prior to our bodily resurrection, is "better by far" than living here on Earth under the Curse, away from the direct presence of God (Philippians 1:23). Still, the intermediate or present Heaven is not our final destination. Though it will be a wonderful place, the present Heaven is not the place we are made for—the place God promises to refashion for us to live in forever. God's children are destined for life as resurrected beings on a resurrected Earth. We must not lose sight of our true destination. If we do, we'll be confused and disoriented in our thinking about where, and in what form, we will spend eternity.
WILL WE LIVE IN HEAVEN FOREVER?
The answer to the question, Will we live in Heaven forever? depends on what we mean by Heaven. Will we be with the Lord forever? Absolutely. Will we always be with him in exactly the same place that Heaven is now? No. In the present Heaven, we'll be in Christ's presence, and we'll be joyful, but we'll be looking forward to our bodily resurrection and permanent relocation to the New Earth.
It bears repeating because it is so commonly misunderstood: When we die, believers in Christ will not go to the Heaven where we'll live forever. Instead, we'll go to an intermediate Heaven. In that Heaven—where those who died covered by Christ's blood are now—we'll await the time of Christ's return to the earth, our bodily resurrection, the final judgment, and the creation of the new heavens and New Earth. If we fail to grasp this truth, we will fail to understand the biblical doctrine of Heaven.
It may seem strange to say that the Heaven we go to at death isn't eternal, yet it's true. "Christians often talk about living with God 'in heaven'forever," writes theologian Wayne Grudem. "But in fact the biblical teaching is richer than that: it tells us that there will be new heavens and a new earth—an entirely renewed creation—and we will live with God there. . . . There will also be a new kind of unification of heaven and earth. . . . There will be a joining of heaven and earth in this new creation."45
Let me suggest an analogy to illustrate the difference between the present Heaven and the eternal Heaven. Suppose you lived in a homeless shelter in Miami. One day you inherit a beautiful house, fully furnished, on a gorgeous hillside overlooking Santa Barbara, California. With the home comes a wonderful job doing something you've always wanted to do. Not only that, but you'll also be near close family members who moved from Miami many years ago.
On your flight to Santa Barbara, you'll change planes in Dallas, where you'll spend an afternoon. Some other family members, whom you haven't seen in years, will meet you at the Dallas airport and board the plane with you to Santa Barbara. You look forward to seeing them.
Now, when the Miami ticket agent asks you, "Where are you headed?" would you say "Dallas"? No. You would say Santa Barbara, because that's your final destination. If you mentioned Dallas at all, you would only say, "I'm going to Santa Barbara by way of Dallas."
When you talk to your friends in Miami about where you're going to live, would you focus on Dallas? No. You might not even mention Dallas, even though you will be a Dallas-dweller for several hours. Even if you spent a week in Dallas, it wouldn't be your focus. Dallas is just a stop along the way. Your true destination—your new permanent home—is Santa Barbara.
At the age of eighty-three I asked myself what knew about the home of God, and I was truly shocked to admit I knew very little....
Increasing age and the fact that I shall soon be making my own pilgrimage, have begotten within my soul an intense desire to explore this fascinating subject.
IVOR POWELL
Similarly, the Heaven we will go to when we die, the present Heaven, is a temporary dwelling place, a stop along the way to our final destination: the New Earth.
Another analogy is more precise but difficult to imagine, because for most of us it's outside our experience. Imagine leaving the homeless shelter in Miami and flying to the intermediate location, Dallas, and then turning around and going back home to your place of origin, which has been completely renovated—a New Miami. In this New Miami, you would no longer live in a homeless shelter, but in a beautiful house in a glorious pollution-free, crime-free, sin-free city. So you would end up living not in a different home, but in a radically improved version of your old home.
This is what the Bible promises us—we will live with Christ and each other forever, not in the intermediate, or present, Heaven, but on the New Earth, where God will be at home with his people.
DOES HEAVEN REALLY CHANGE?
Only God is eternal and self-existent. All else is created. Heaven is not synonymous with God, nor is it part of his essential being. Therefore, God must have created Heaven. It is not a place where he must dwell, but it is where he chooses to dwell. Because Heaven is a place where angels live, where finite beings come and go, it appears to be a finite environment, a specific location.
Because God created Heaven, it had a beginning and is therefore neither timeless nor changeless. It had a past (the time prior to Christ's incarnation, death, and resurrection), it has a present (the Heaven where believers go when they die), and it will have a future (the eternal Heaven, or New Earth). The past Heaven, the present Heaven, and the future or eternal Heaven can all be called Heaven, yet they are not synonymous, even though they are all God's dwelling places.
Books on Heaven often fail to distinguish between the intermediate and eternal states, using the one word—Heaven—as all-inclusive. But this has dulled our thinking and keeps us from understanding important biblical distinctions. In this book, when referring to the place believers go after death, I use terms such as thepresent Heaven or the intermediate Heaven. I'll refer to the eternal state as the eternal Heaven or the New Earth. I hope you can see why this is such an important distinction. The present Heaven is a temporary lodging, awaiting place until the return of Christ and our bodily resurrection. The eternal Heaven, the New Earth, is our true home, the place where we will live forever with our Lord and each other. The great redemptive promises of God will find their ultimate fulfillment on the New Earth, not in the present Heaven.
When we speak about the future New Earth, as we'll do in most of this book, much of what we say about it may not be true of the intermediate Heaven. (For instance, we will eat and drink in our resurrection bodies on the New Earth, but that doesn't mean people eat and drink in the present Heaven.) And when we describe the present Heaven, it will not necessarily correspond with what the eternal Heaven, the New Earth, will be like. Once we abandon our assumptions that Heaven cannot change, it all makes sense. God does not change; he's immutable. But God clearly says that Heaven will change. It will eventually be relocated to the New Earth (Revelation 21:1). Similarly, what we now refer to as Hell will also be relocated. After the Great White Throne Judgment, Hell w
ill be cast into the eternal lake of fire (Revelation 20:14-15).
DISTINGUISHING THE PRESENT AND FUTURE HEAVENS
The questions, What is Heaven like? and, What will Heaven be like? have two different answers. The present, intermediate Heaven is in the angelic realm, distinctly separate from Earth (though as we'll see, likely having more physical qualities than we might assume). By contrast, the future Heaven will be in the human realm, on Earth. Then the dwelling place of God will also be the dwelling place of humanity in a resurrected universe: "I saw a new heaven and a new earth. . . . I saw the Holy City the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from G o d . . . . And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, 'Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God'" (Revelation 21:1-3). Heaven, God's dwelling place, will one day be on the New Earth.
Notice that the New Jerusalem, which was in Heaven, will come down out of Heaven from God. Where does it go? To the New Earth. From that time on, "the dwelling of God" will be with redeemed mankind on Earth
Some would argue that the New Earth shouldn't be called Heaven. But it seems clear to me that if God's special dwelling place is by definition Heaven, and we're told that "the dwelling of God" will be with mankind on Earth, then Heaven and the New Earth will be essentially the same place. We're told that "the throne of God and of the Lamb" is in the New Jerusalem, which is brought down to the New Earth (Revelation 22:1). Again, it seems clear that wherever God dwells with his people and sits on his throne would be called Heaven.
I concur with theologian Anthony Hoekema, who writes, "The 'new Jerusalem' . . . does not remain in a 'heaven' far off in space, but it comes down to the renewed earth; there the redeemed will spend eternity in resurrection bodies. So heaven and earth, now separated, will then be merged: the new earth will also be heaven, since God will dwell there with his people. Glorified believers, in other words, will continue to be in heaven while they are inhabiting the new earth."46